Seeking Three
by TimeManipulator99
Summary: Follow Antony Septimus as he hunts down the three people who murdered his family in the midst of civil war in a divided United States. But, will he get more than he bargained for along the way and what will he learn? Rated M for lots of violence and some language. (OCcentric)


**_A/N: So, this story really isn't about Assassin's and Templars or Assassin's Creed in general. It kinda follows that type of storyline, though, so I'm going with that. I will not, however, shoehorn characters from AC into this story. Warning: this is OCcentric! Only if I deem it necessary in the story will people like Desmond, Rebecca, Shaun, or Bill make an appearance. Now, onto the story._  
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**Chapter 1**

My name... is Antony Septimus. I _was _an ordinary teen, with ordinary teen problems with the average hope of somehow making it in the real world, but no. My life had to be different. I was caught up in the Second Civil War of the United States of America. Except this time, it was the West and the East.

The East calling themselves the New Roman Empire (maybe they were boasting their power or they actually think they equal the Romans), while the West was dubbed the Confederate Republic of States. When the first gunshot rang through a small town in Texas, things escalated pretty quickly. Soon, some guys from Cali were attacking Michigan, Kentucky launched an assault on Nevada; shoot, not even the center states were safe. The Dakotas, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma were split down the middle between the ideals of the east and west. Texas is desolate; nothing left there but corpses and rubble.

Most states that are near the center are nearly destroyed. Most of their citizens except for some scavengers who remained were evacuated to the edges of the country. The states that aren't either close to the edges or on the edges are empty. They have been for months now. They became barren, save for a few small towns and the military that are constantly at each other.

Right now, states stretching from Ohio to Utah are just straight up battlefields. We call the entire area 'The Deadlands'. But not all of them are hell, though. The states like Idaho, Utah, Arizona, and Montana are half peaceful, half battlefield. Talk about taking what you can get.

Me, well, I'm 17. I used to live with my family in Colorado. But, that's something for a different time. This is the story of how I unwittingly turned the tides of a war, of how I found friends in very unexpected places.

This is the story of my revenge.

* * *

My plan after things went south was to head from home to the capital of the Confederacy in Seattle to get info on three different people; Archibald Lennox, Nora McGann, and Burke Mills. So, I took a pistol off a dead guy I crossed (nearly tossed my lunch from the smell) and grabbed my two blades. See, I have two wrist-blades that look and work a lot like the Hidden Blades from the video game, _Assassin's Creed_, courtesy of a close friend who works a homemade forge. He was a big prepper, just as much as he was a conspiracy theorist. And having a third degree black belt in Martial Arts doesn't hurt, either.

The first time I ever killed a person, I killed a woman who was going to rob me. I admit, she had a bigger gun, more experience, but when she got what she wanted (which was my wallet and pistol), I stabbed her. Right in the back, too. But, I got my stuff back, if that's any consolation. All I have is my wallet, my gun, blades (which were always strapped to my forearms), and what I wear, which was a pair of dark jeans, a pair of black chuck taylors, and a white t-shirt with red accents around the shoulders and down the center of the back.

But, I still cried myself to sleep that night.

I'd mostly been on foot, taking cars that worked when I could, only running into trouble that I could take out quietly. Every now and again, I'd run into full on frontal assaults between the NRE and the Confederates. I could easily sneak by them, but, it still worries me when I get there. So, one day, I had just made it to Salt Lake City, the last real _big _mess of a city before I got to the peaceful part of the state. Seeing as it had been nearly ten months since the start of the war, months of artillery fire had taken chunks out of the buildings and left rubble at their bases.

I always stuck to alleyways, with the occasional main street, because I'm not a very skilled person with my blades in open combat, but with my _fists_, I'm more than capable. I'm more of a _silencer _than a warrior with the blades, if you catch my drift. But, this time, I wasn't so lucky. I was walking still, my pale, ice-blue eyes trained on the path ahead. As most of the people I met along the way to Utah described me, I was... cold. I was _not_ cold, just focused on my objectives; I prioritized.

But, on the other hand, my prioritizing got them killed.

But, I shook the thought from my head and went towards the sounds. I caught a glimpse of about five people beating on someone. Swiftly, I ducked behind a wall to avoid being seen. As I watched, I saw two of them (one male, the other female) were holding heragainst what was left of a brick wall, one was (I assumed by the pauses) asking questions, and the other two were standing guard over the ordeal. I tried to scan the whole situation for gaps, but to no avail; I wouldn't have been able to do it without getting into open conflict. So, I just start across the street, taking care not to raise their attention.

She spitting profuse insults at them, boy, she had a mouth on her, but I could hear her nearly begging them to let her go. It wasn't begging, for the tone was demanding, but I knew better. With a sigh, I made a silent apology and kept going. But then, I heard her yell, "Hey, you! Help me! Yeah, behind the car!"

_'Crap,' _I thought. Now she had done me in. I stood and sent a glare her way that could freeze a blaze solid. Who I presumed was the leader of the gang turned around. He was tanned with one eye blinded and the other deep brown.

His hair was very short, brown as well. He spoke, with all to much sarcasm for my taste, "Oh, yes. Save her, Hero. It'll be your head, though. But, I'm feeling generous, so I'll give you the chance to run. Run like the coward you know you are, kid!"

Though, shameful to say, I considered running, it would've been only for a brief moment because something snapped in my mind as I remembered the words, carved into my mind. That... That horrible voice:

_I remember he cackled. It made me shiver, right down to my bones, "Go ahead, laddie. Run. Run away like the coward you are."_

The voice repeated itself in my head until I found myself charging at them. The leader motioned one of his goons, the woman, to get me. She threw a punch; I ducked under it, rolled behind her, and kicked her knees from under her. Before even _I _could think, her neck was snapped by my hands. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw another one of the goons point a pistol at me, so I flowed with the motion of my hand's snapping motion and grabbed the nearby man who hand been hold the girl to the wall.

Bringing him in front of me, the gunshot delayed any reaction the man would've had to being pulled by me. He cried out in pain as I dropped him like a rock and headed straight for the man with the gun. Both the other goon and the leader were running towards me to gang up on me, which sort of worked. They had me surrounded in a triangular kind of formation. I stopped and got into what I was pretty sure was the proper stance for using the Hidden Blades.

But, then I snapped out of whatever funk I was in and that did not make me any more calm. I charged at the guy with the gun and, before he could shoot me down, I wrenched the weapon from from him. All the while, the other two, the leader and the man with the crowbar charged at me from both sides. And in the midst of this madness, I was wondering...

Where was the girl I was 'saving'? The one who'd dragged me from my stealthy cover.

Anyway, back to the two guys attacking me. I ducked under the crowbar, grabbing it at the same time as dodging it. I swung the end of it around, along with the man at the other end, sending him flying into the leader and equally freeing him of the crowbar he was gripping. Spinning on my heels, I took the crowbar and swung it across Pistol Guy's head, hitting it with a sickening _'crack!'_, which sent him to the ground, dead. Still holding the crowbar in my left hand and the pistol in the other, I turned around to look at the last two, who were getting up off the ground.

Crowbar Guy, weaponless now, picked up a large piece of wooden beam and charged at me again. It was deflected by my crowbar and I pistol whipped him in the face, immediately followed by the crowbar. My arms crossed and the pistol under my left arm, I fired a shot into Crowbar Guy's abdomen, leaving him to squirm on the ground for a minute before dying. Now, it was my time to charge, which I did right towards the leader. He, apparently, had a chain that he kept wrapped around his torso, coming over his shoulder.

It kind of reminded me of the Ghost Rider. He unraveled it and, as I barreled toward him, swung the chain at me. It wrapped around the pistol in my hand and took it from my grasp with a firm yank! I stumbled forward, but continued with my assault by trying to take him out (albeit clumsily) with the crowbar still in my left hand. But, he took a hold of it with both hands, forced it downward, and just like that, _headbutted me_!

Here I was, thinking nobody won in a headbutt, but through my spinning (slightly blurry) vision, I could see he was barely fazed by it. The leader tackled me to the ground shortly after that and began to show me how experience greatly outweighed position and title (oh, yes, I was arrogant about my black belt). He straddled my chest, putting his knees on my arms, effectively making me unable to lift them. He just kept punching me in my face, but then came the terrifying part. He put his hand on my neck and squeezed.

I could breathe less and less as he squeezed his hands tighter. My legs slid along the ground randomly, trying to get me away from the danger, obviously failing. After a few seconds, my face burned from the lack of oxygen, as did it begin to turn blue. Regardless of the fact Leader was sitting on my biceps, my panic drove me to try to lift my arms to cut him down with my blades. But, they too burned, hungering sweet air.

My eyes were beginning to roll into the back of my head. Seriously, it seemed like my life was going to end right there; my blades were right there, too. They were extended and tipped at his side, but it wasn't enough. I closed my eyes and let consciousness slip away.

* * *

My eyes opened...

My eyes opened! Either I was alive or one could open their eyes when they're dead, but when I saw the blue sky above and the wreckage of Salt Lake City, I bolted upright. Immediately, I was met with a burst of dizziness and a swirl of colors like green, purple, and pink in my line of sight. Groaning, I put my hand to my head, rubbing lightly. A voice sounded behind me, "I was wondering when you would wake up."

Her voice was smooth, not very soft, and did I detect a hint of a French accent? Not very profound, but it was there, for sure. I looked over to her, "Well, I'm up now."

I admit, _that _came out a bit mean, but hey, I had to keep people away from me. Too many people had died under my watch for me to let someone else in. When I got a good look at her, I saw she had strawberry blonde hair that was tied back into a ponytail with a lock that came down partially over her left eye. A big contrast to my pitch black hair that I tried to keep in a style reminiscent of David Tennent, which I'd done my hair in so many times, it just sort of stayed that way permanently. Her skin was slightly tanned and she wore only a white tank top with baggy black pants that were tucked into some black hiking boots.

I observed the slight bulge poking the fabric of her side cargo pocket, which, I knew it was a knife. _'Smart,'_ was the only thought to run through my head. But, to tell the truth, I was asking myself... 'who only carries a knife in the Deadlands?' My musings were interrupted by her voice, "Thank you for rescuing me, uhh..."

"Antony."

"Ooh, I like that! 'Antony'."

I got up and went over to the Leader, who was crumpled on the ground, blood leaking from the back of his head. He was still breathing, though. So, I popped out a Hidden Blade on one arm and stabbed him in the side of his neck where his jugular was. He tensed for a second under my hands, then went limp. The woman gasped behind me, "What was that for?! He wasn't a threat!"

I retorted coldly, "He needed to die."

"No he didn't!" she said.

I began to walk away, "Yes he did."

"Why?"

I stopped and sighed, "Because," once again, I began to walk away.

She started to follow me. Honestly, that one was unexpected, mostly because after I completely disregarded human life in front of someone, they really didn't want to follow me. But, _no_, this one had to completely disregard my disregard! "Hey!" she called out, "'Because' isn't an answer!"

"Yes it is. Now, stop following me," I told her.

"No."

And thus began a terrible, terrible cycle. I kept walking, she kept following, and we both kept repeating the same part of an argument for, like, two hours. It went maybe a little something like this...

"Stop following me."

"No."

"Stop following me."

"No."

"Stop following me."

"No."

That went on for about thirty minutes before I spun on my heels to face her, "Do you want to die?"

She gave me a weird look, eyebrow raised, "No. That's why I asked you to rescue me. It would defeat the point if I _wanted _to die."

"Then don't follow me," I told her, glaring into her eyes.

"Listen," she ordered, "You saved my life, so I'm going to follow you."

With a sigh of exasperation, I said, "Just... Just- Stop following me!"

"No."

"Gah!" I turned and started walking.

So, for the next hour and a half, the cycle continued. But, halfway through the second hour, I was smirking, and by the end of it, I was smiling. I hadn't smiled since the beginning months of the war! I stopped and she asked, "What is it?"

"We're stopping for the night," I told her.

She smiled, "Ooh, 'we'?"

"D-Don't get used to it. As soon as we get out of the Deadlands, you're on your own," I tried to glower, but completely failed.

As I was gathering some wood for the fire, the woman said, "Don't you have something to sleep on?"

"Yes, actually," I was feeling sarcastic at the moment, "It's called the ground."

She crossed her arms and melodramatically whined, "Aw... You got my hopes up."

I actually chuckled, but I realized something, "So, what's your name?"

"My name is Cloé LeBlanc," she nearly sung.

The way she said that made me think she'd been waiting the whole time to introduce herself. Well, that was my take on it. Maybe she was just like this all the time. Nevertheless, I shook the thought from my head and finished the fire. _'Get control of yourself, Septimus! Don't go making attachments!'_ I scolded myself, resetting my cold facade. "Goodnight, Cloé."

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_**A/N: It's pretty good start, right. Let me know if it was too fast or slow paced. I like feedback. Anyway, if anyone is confused on how Antony looks, he has black hair, styled like David Tennent (really, there is no other way to describe him), icy blue eyes, and his outfit was clearly described in the story. Except there's a belt for his pistol around his stomach-ish area, it isn't his waist, but it's not his actual stomach. His height is around 6'0, give or take.**_

_**Yes, the whole revenge thing has been done, but I've put a new spin on it that I personally like. He's not going to be an automatic awesome vortex of Hidden Blade epicness. No, he's actually going to be pretty clumsy at first. This first fight was more hand-to-hand, only using the blades to finish off the boss, which, Antony is excellent with melee combat.**_

_**But, haha! There will be a lot more of those fights and a lot more bloody than that! So, until next time, see ya!**_


End file.
